[Rudaw] Amnesty International on Wednesday criticized Iraqi authorities for carrying out the death sentences of 13 men on the same day, saying the prisoners were denied fair trial, and expressed concern that many others had been executed in secret.
A total of 13 prisoners were executed in Dhi Qar’s Nasiriyah central prison on Monday, and scores more have been executed since April 10, said the Amnesty report citing activists and lawyers of the death row prisoners.
"Iraq’s recent executions are alarming and disheartening. For years, a legacy of human rights violations and abuses have plagued Iraq’s justice system, landing thousands on death row after grossly unfair trials," said Razaw Salihy, Amnesty International’s Iraq researcher.
Eleven of the men were convicted based on their alleged affiliation to the Islamic State (ISIS), while the other two were had been detained since 2008 and convicted of terrorism-related charges.
Amnesty said that the two men were tortured and forced to sign documents they were not allowed to read, which were later revealed to be confessions, according to their lawyers and relatives. The men were denied a re-trial.
"Amnesty International looked into documents issued in 2020 by the judicial committee in charge of reviewing these requests, which stated that a review of the cases could not be carried out as per the law because the casefiles had been lost," said the report, describing the losing of the casefiles as "utterly callous and outrageous."
The rights watchdog called on Baghdad to "immediately" establish a moratorium on executions and abolish the death penalty.
Since the rise of ISIS in 2014, thousands of people have been detained across Iraq for suspected links to terrorist groups, including ISIS, while hundreds have been executed. The United Nations has criticized Iraq’s trials of ISIS suspects, saying proceedings have not met fair trial standards and raising concerns about allegations of torture.
Iraq has often been criticized for poor prison conditions and treatment of detainees and suspects.
Access to data on executions in Iraq is limited. UN experts in January said they were "deeply concerned about the secretive nature of the implementation of the death penalty in Iraq," after 13 men were executed on the same day in late December.
More than 8,000 are purportedly on death row in Iraq, with at least 150 at the imminent risk of execution, according to Amnesty.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
04/28/2024 07:05 ||
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#1
saying the prisoners were denied fair trial
Thankfully they are still alive, but I can think of a few January 6th political prisoners that might fit Amnesty International's bill.
[Rudaw] A "terrorist" drone attack on Khor Mor gas field in Sulaimani province killed four Yemen nationals on Friday evening, said the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) spokesperson. The attack also affected power generation in the Kurdistan Region.
Khor Mor gas field in Chamchamal, operated by the UAE-based Dana Gas, was attacked by a drone, Ramik Ramazan, the mayor of Chamchamal, told Rudaw.
"It is the same place that was hit last time," he said, referring to a January 26 drone attack on the field and adding that the area is "under construction."
KRG spokesperson Peshawa Hawramani called the incident a "terrorist" attack and said four Yemen nationals were killed.
The attack caused "a huge amount of damage to the field and this damage will dramatically decrease the production of power," Hawramani added in a statement, calling on the federal government to find the perpetrators and prevent such attacks from happening in the future.
Ramazan later told reporters that two other Yemen nationals were slightly injured in the attack.
No group has claimed responsibility.
Khor Mor field produces 452 million standard cubic feet of gas per day, according to Dana Gas. The gas is a key fuel source for electricity generation plants in the Kurdistan Region, which has been affected.
"Due to a drone attack on the Khor Mor field, the sending of gas to power generation stations has been halted and as a result electricity generation has dropped by nearly 2,500 megawatts," read a joint statement from the KRG’s electricity and natural resources ministries.
They added that the staff of both ministries are working to restore electricity production.
Electricity generation has dropped to just 1,260 MW, according to the government spokesperson.
KRG Deputy Prime Minister Qubad Talabani condemned the attack.
"We call on the Iraqi government and the relevant authorities in the [Kurdistan] Region to immediately launch a detailed investigation and take serious steps to prevent the repetition of these attacks, which cause the death of civilians," he said in a statement.
KRG Prime Minister Masrour Barzani condemned Khor Mor attack, saying that initial information indicated it was carried out from ’a nearby region within Iraq’ and demands ’swift action’ from Baghdad.
Khor Mor field has come under rocket attacks several times over the past few years, reportedly by Iraqi militia groups affiliated with Iran. The attack on the field in January occurred during a spate of rocket and drone strikes by Iraqi armed groups that mainly targeted American forces and rarely caused casualties or damage.
Despite the security threat, Dana Gas said in 2022 that they would be able to meet the Kurdistan Region’s full gas demands in about two years.
[Rudaw] The Iraqi government is repatriating more than 700 people affiliated with the Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that they were al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're really very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear western pols talk they're not really Moslems.... (ISIS) from al-Hol camp in northeast Syria (Rojava), the migration ministry said on Saturday.
Ali Abbas, spokesperson for Iraq’s ministry of migration and displaced, said that they will repatriate 750 Iraqis from al-Hol camp.
"Due to security reasons, we cannot reveal the date of their return, but it will be later this month," he told Rudaw’s Nahro Mohammed.
A group of some 165 families, totaling more than 700 people, have left al-Hol camp and are expected to arrive in al-Jada camp in Nineveh province within the coming two days, an Iraqi politician who closely monitors the matter told Rudaw English on Saturday.
The MP, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said that more people were registered to be repatriated but some chose to stay in Syria.
Abbas told Rudaw last month that a total of around 2,000 families, or 8,000 individuals, have been returned to Iraq from al-Hol camp so far.
Iraqis and Syrians make up the majority of the 40,000 ISIS-linked people who have been held at al-Hol camp in northeast Syria’s Hasaka province since the defeat of the terror group in 2019. The camp has been branded a breeding ground for terrorism. Iraqi National Security Advisor Qasim al-Araji last month said that around 20,000 Iraqis below the age of 18 are still at al-Hol. He described them as "time bombs."
Kurdish authorities in northeast Syria have repeatedly called on the international community to repatriate their nationals from the camps, but their calls have largely gone unanswered as most countries are unwilling to bring back their citizens due to security concerns.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
04/28/2024 06:55 ||
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#1
Hope they are of the traditional sexual alignment.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
![]("Pix/isis_79096859.jpg" "\"Islamic")
...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that they were al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're really very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling 
